When the World Tips Over

Cassidy says she will tell her story in three betrayals. She begins when she is eight and living with her mother, Marigold, in an RV they’ve named Sadie Mae. Marigold had a vision of a place she calls The Town and is searching for it on what she calls their great California adventure. Cassidy describes her mother as having many different faces. Her mother disapproves of the collection of insects that Cassidy keeps as pets. Cassidy is fascinated by her mother and her stories that begin “in the time of forever” (109). Even now, she tells Wynton, “my mother’s stories, those strange fables, cling to me” (113). After a school lesson on California history, Cassidy asks about the rest of their family. All she’s been told is that her father died in a surfing accident. Her mother retreats into The Silent World, when she lies in bed and doesn’t move, and Cassidy cannot reach her. When her mother wakes, she takes Cassidy’s jars and frees the insects, though Cassidy sobs and says they are her friends. This is the first betrayal. The chapter ends with an excerpt from one of Marigold’s stories that Cassidy has taken.

Dizzy and her mother arrive at the hospital and learn of Wynton’s injuries from Doc Larry. Dizzy tries to find ways to pray or bargain with God. Dizzy tells her mother that Wynton “has lightning inside him […] Like the white truffle” (152), referencing their shared interest in the mystical properties of mushrooms. They learn that Cassidy, Dizzy’s angel, is the one who called 911 for Wynton. Dizzy feels that his getting hurt is her fault because she let him sneak into the house. In an unsent letter to her mother, Bernadette reflects on her grief at her brother’s death and feels that Wynton’s injury is a punishment for what she, Bernadette, has done.

Miles spends the night sleeping in the vineyard to avoid Wynton. He’s trying not to get sucked back into the state of mind he calls “The Gloom Room” (130). The Fall vineyards feel sad to Miles. Sandro tries to cheer him up. Miles reflects on how he’s always been Perfect Miles, but that doesn’t feel like him; rather, “He was an actor who’d become his character” (133). Uncle Clive comes to get Miles, saying that something bad has happened to his brother.

Betrayal two begins when Cassidy is 12. She and her mother are camping at Sister Falls in northern California. They are both irritated to find another RV parked at their site. Marigold wants to be far away from civilization, though Cassidy wants to live in a town and have friends. At their last RV park, Cassidy thought she had made a friend, but Marigold was condescending to the girl’s mother, who noticed Marigold’s prescription medications. Cassidy is upset when Marigold makes them leave, and as an apology, Marigold reveals that her parents died when she was 17, a year before Cassidy was born. Cassidy realizes that her mother’s “in the time of forever” stories are retellings of her own life history. They swim in the waterfall.

The man in the other trailer approaches them as Marigold is cooking. Cassidy instantly dislikes the man, but her mother is interested and invites him to dinner. He says his name is Dave Caputo. Her mother spends the night with Dave and ignores Cassidy the next morning. Cassidy runs into the forest, crying, and gets lost. She fears that her mother wants to be rid of her. She wakes up when Dave finds her, and Cassidy feels reassured that her mother will always care about her more than anyone else.

Wynton wonders several things about Cassidy’s story, including how she knows his chess partner, Dave Caputo. The night nurses discuss how Cassidy climbs through the window after visiting hours are over.

Cassidy enjoys spending time with Dave. He is a good cook and fun to be around, and most of all, “Dave is present. It’s hard to explain the relief of this, of having someone around […] who’s not in The Silent World” (166). She notices that her mom is happier when Dave is around too. Dave tells his life history to Cassidy and Marigold: He ran away from his father and his architect life and opened a furniture shop. He tells about a bakery in his town where a woman named Bernadette makes soufflés that make a person fall in love. Marigold admits she is in love with Dave, and Cassidy dreams of having a dad and a normal family, like people in books and movies.

Wynton wants to tell Cassidy that he loves her and warn her about Dave Caputo.

Cassidy helps Dave make crêpes for dinner. She and her mother dress up for dinner. Dave asks Marigold to marry him. Cassidy shouts yes. The next morning, Dave’s rig is gone. Marigold retreats to The Silent World, and when she emerges, she decides they will find Dave. They can’t find Dave online, but they find the location of Bernadette’s soufflé shop. Cassidy stores some of her mother’s writings in a bag under her mattress, which she calls a bag of words. The chapter concludes with a story from the bag of words, about lovers who cannot be together.

As she, her mother, and Miles sit in the hospital, Dizzy thinks of ways she might help Wynton. She wishes she could lock everyone she loves in the house so they would be safe. Dizzy and her mother take comfort in one another, but Miles remains distant. Clive is nearby but doesn’t enter the room. He tries playing violin music to wake Wynton. Bernadette writes to Wynton and then to Dizzy, describing how her mother grieved after Christophe died and only spoke again when they visited Paradise Springs and decided to live there. They decided to buy the bakery and name it Christophe’s. Other excerpts are of Miles’s emails to his father.

Wynton dwells on his regrets, including how he was not a good brother to Miles.

Chef Finn makes gumbo in hopes of waking Wynton. Dizzy leaves a voicemail for Lizard. She thinks, “She didn’t know what people were supposed to do with the leftover love that no one wanted anymore” (197). She is in the chapel when Felix Rivera enters with gumbo for her. Felix is very tall, wildly dressed, and exuberant in his manner, and when it begins to rain, Dizzy thinks he caused it. They talk, and Dizzy learns that Felix drove down to Paradise Springs with a rainbow-haired girl in an orange truck, who told him that she was researching Alonso Fall, the man who started the town of Paradise Springs.